Anthony Manning

by Sean Cooper
English experimental electronic composer Anthony Manning maintains something of an odd connection to the stylistic involutions of his contemporaries. Although he uses the tools of the techno trade, dabbles in some of dance musics less obvious rhythmic structures, is signed to a techno label (Irdial), and appeals most often to admirers of dance-based experimental electronica, his music is closer in its concerns to academic and minimalist composers such as Steve Reich, LaMonte Young, and Morton Feldman. Mannings compositions for synthesizer and drum machine are generally written on graphic scores, with the final shape of his pieces — while still a combination of planning and the accidents of timbre and shape resulting from the nature of programmable instruments — determined, in certain respects, before a single note is played. His 1994 Irdial debut, Islets in Pink Polypropylene, was composed for a single instrument — the Roland R8 drum machine — and his subsequent full-length, 1996s Chromium Nebulae, was a similarly austere smudge of off-kilter analog experimentation, with Mannings focus on hand-made sounds and interacting textures more often than not surprassing any overtly musical intent. Mannings work has also been featured on the Ash International compilation A Fault in the Nothing, and his third album for Irdial, Concision, was released in early 1998.